Jagged
by The Unbreakable Snape Fan
Summary: Snape is informed of Lily's death.


**Jagged**

"Sev'rus," called the man, blubbering all over himself. He knocked at the door, but his size made the whole thing rattle.

Severus started. Yawning, he hurried to the door and unlocked it with a wave of his hand. There stood Rubeus Hagrid, crying. Admittedly, Hagrid crying in itself was not a rare occurrence, but to come to Snape's quarters, above the entire rest of the school? It had to be an Order thing. He stared up at the man. He realized it probably would have been nice to let him into his rooms, but he fully intended on getting back to sleep after hearing whatever it was Hagrid had to say—if he would ever out with it. At this point, it seemed a likely possibility that he may just continue crying for all eternity and Snape would _never_ get any sleep.

"L-Lily and James, Severus!"

Snape had been in the middle of stifling a yawn when he said this, but now immediately seemed to come to his usual alertness. He stared at the half-giant. "They're . . . dead."

"Yes! Oh Sev'rus!" He threw his large arms around the professor. Snape slunk out of his grasp slowly and pushed the door closed, ill-caring what the half-giant thought. Let him find someone else to comfort him. Salazar knew there were plenty more willing than he.

Snape paced the main room of his quarters, looking half-mad in his night shirt in the wee hours of the morning, lapping his plain couch to no end. Finally he did leave the room, grabbing his wand so that he might unlock his new classroom.

If he did it quietly . . . no one would be the wiser until the morning. He stood and leafed through the stores. Of course there were all sorts of venoms, from plants and animals alike, but that was a bit boring, wasn't it? If he actually mixed up a poison that would be sure to work, that might give someone time to find him and tell him he was an important part of the wizarding world that would be missed. He laughed out loud at this thought, sounding perhaps a bit unbalanced—which was more or less true.

He put out the fire he'd just lit under the cauldron and sat down at one of the student desks. He fought back some more hysterical laughter. He ran a hand over his face, taking a deep breath. Alright. He got up and closed the stores, levitating the cauldron over to the stone gargoyle sink. However, he hesitated before he dumped out the water. Giving himself a mental shake, he gritted his teeth. Committing himself to pour the water out this time, he surprised himself with a new surge of emotion, and the cauldron flew at the stone wall, splattering the stone with lukewarm water.

He put his wand down on a desk for safety, and grasped the cauldron which had now fallen to the floor with a loud clank. He replaced the cauldron in a cabinet and ran a hand over his oily black hair. Okay. Breathe. He needed to get out of this room. He would be able to think more clearly in the morning.

He knew death would be futile, as futile as life always had been and more. Well—why? Why wouldn't it be better than living?

He would never see Lily again. It wasn't like they had spoken in a good few years, but he would _never see Lily again_. He would never see Lily again.

He would never see Lily again.

He heard the tinkle of breaking glass and stared blankly at the shelf of ingredients nearest him. He stared at the manticore venom, a perfect golden amber as it clung to shards of sharp glass, glass sharp enough to easily cut flesh. Easily. How easily? With a wandless Summoning Charm, he found a nice-sized hunk of glass was dripping with the stuff.

"It was an accident," he pictured someone saying the next morning. "He cut himself."

"An accident," he murmured. Just like it was an accident that Lily had been targeted in the first place, an accident he had overheard, an accident she was dead. And now it would be an accident that he was dead on the floor of his new classroom. He smirked to himself, but it didn't reach the fear-laced coldness of his eyes.

Lily would never have to know how weak he was. Lily, who had red hair like no one else's, and the most peculiar green eyes that her new son supposedly shared in. Eyes were, however, windows to the soul, and he'd be damned if windows could be hereditary. He did not have windows to his father's soul, nor to his mother's. He had his own. Windows to abandoned shops, houses in old ghost towns. He owned broken windows in front of which children had played baseball a little too roughly, had cracked with stones. He didn't have windows, just endless voids. He'd often been called blind to the world around him. It wasn't his fault that the building contractors of his body had forgotten to add the windows. Not his fault at all.

"Get off my floors," said Dumbledore. He looked rather annoyed at the sight in front of him, and Severus vaguely wondered for just how long the man had been there. He turned to look at him and with a neutral expression, he slit at the back of his hand. Wincing, he felt it start to work with a small moan of pain.

Dumbledore's expression grew more intense in his outrage. "If that's the way it's going to be, Severus, keep in mind that the reason the venom will not have killed you is your own fault. You've got no one but yourself to blame for living. Congratulations for your suberb work in antidotes. _Get up_."

Snape dropped the jagged piece he'd used to cut himself and watched the pile of venom-covered glass with longing as Dumbledore pulled him bodily to the hospital wing.


End file.
